Azerbaijan’s Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov, speaking on the ITV program Line of Contact, spoke about Türkiye’s unprecedented support during the 44-day Patriotic War.
According to him, Ankara’s support was “unambiguous and invaluable.” The minister noted that Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, who was then serving as Türkiye’s foreign minister, visited Azerbaijan five times during the 44 days — sometimes flying in for just a few hours, simply to demonstrate solidarity and stand side by side with Baku.
Bayramov also shared, for the first time, a previously unknown fact: a message was sent from Ankara to all Turkish embassies stating that instructions coming from Baku were to be treated as directives from Ankara itself.
“And I want to emphasize another point, perhaps unknown to the Azerbaijani public — I have never spoken about this before. During those days, Ankara sent a unified message to all Turkish embassies: instructions coming from Baku carry the same authority as those coming from Ankara. Of course, there are state rules and diplomatic etiquette, and we did not act on this directly. We never contacted any Turkish embassy ourselves. Whenever we needed to convey something, we did so through the Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs,” he said.
He stressed that despite diplomatic protocol, the very fact of such a step is unique in international practice and became a symbol of the genuine brotherhood between Azerbaijan and Türkiye.
